Couples divorce over the stupidest things. A toilet seat left up. That annoying thing he does picking his nose. Farting all the time. Never makes a proper cup of tea. These things are only the presenting issues, the real problem is lack of communication, trust and shared goals. So it is with much somber fanfare that we enter this dangerous time for UK. The options are STFU – Shut the fuck up” or GTFO – Get The Fuck Out. Lump of leave it, all or nothing menu. It is like going to restaurant with a set menu that you all must eat regardless, even if you are allergic, you cannot remove the foods that can kill you. If you complain that you are allergic to peanuts, everyone will say they are allergic to peanuts, then we’ll have to change the menu for everyone. Britain wants a more flexible relationship with EU, to opt out of this and that, but the EU is on course for a Superstate that will swallow all around. That’s fine if you have no history, or you are ashamed of it, but not if you are a proud nation like UK. It’s like Elvis joining the Beatles, it would be economically sound but egos will clash.

As an African I have had a strange ambivalence to the EU, it is a benign force for good within its borders, but it is an economic bully that is destroying Africa. I arrived in UK in 93 when the nation was changing from its past form to a future glory as yet unknown. It never happened, the flails of globalism killed what little industrial jobs there were. I worked for companies, downsizing, mechanizing, outsourcing for quarterly profits. Around 2000, I got many friends from back home in Africa coming over to Britain almost weekly. We’d have the old gang back together again. Jobs were plentiful, you’d arrive on Sunday and be working by Monday. They quickly climbed the ladder of success, for these were not idle lazy Africans but the best the continent had to offer. At my workplace, I was told to bring as many of my friends as I could. The shortage of labor was driving this immigration, the nation was getting browner, new music, food, dance, and subcultures were taking over. This made many native Brits uncomfortable and the right-wing media was apoplectic. Then these immigrants were stopped from working, and made to use food vouchers. This made employers lobby for Eastern Europeans to plug this gap, to flush out the brown immigrants. Europe used to funnel its refugees to UK, French border guards help refugees cross over the relieve themselves of having to deal with foreigners.

The EU is a double-headed monster, the biggest advocate for democracy in Africa, and yet, it is inherently undemocratic. The officials are unelected, unaccountable, unreachable in their ivory towers, and looking down on these stupid mortals. It is unsustainable in its debts, incoherent in its vision, and dying. There is no avoiding that Europe will slowly fade away as new powers emerge, for nations are born, then age, and die laying in their own filth. The EU is a nursing home for nations waiting to die, better off together, but they hasten their demise by reinforcing negative habits. They love the fried greasy bacon of debt that periodically gives economic heart attacks, solution – more greasy bacon. The EU is a cancer, it causes cancer, feeds it through the Common Agricultural Policy. Whenever we would try to buy food from Africa, a sweet potato, plantain, cassava, beans, to remind us of home we find it costs 10 times what it costs back home. Food is slapped with a 350% tariff plus transport and other costs. All the food they have in the supermarkets is cancer-causing, full of pesticide, preservatives and other chemicals. As long as it is the right colour, length, and the angle of the curve it is fine and forget nutrition. However, it is full of cancer and has no nutritional value, if you want non-cancer food then you must earn more to buy organic. Then you slap a 350% tax on a perishable food that is cancer-free.

All this said, Brexit would be disastrous for UK in the short-term, they are joined at the hip and there will be blood. Why can’t EU be flexible enough to negotiate aspects of its membership? Why is it all or nothing? The EU has thousands of laws and even the best proponents can’t agree with every single one. So why did the politicians make it a zero-sum game? They tried to stare down the British voters to shut them up once and for all, and they might get slapped in the face for it. After tiny Greece almost brought down the Behemoth, they decided to pick a fight with UK. The actual changes UK wants are not too big, looser confederation as an option for some, some kind of control over immigration, Germany doesn’t allow Poles and other neighbors to work there, yet they force UK to allow them. It will be a narrow victory for Remain, but even if we vote to Leave, they’ll just make us vote again until we stay, as we saw with the Nice Treaty and others. I hope UK gradually decouples from the EU over coming years, having 65% trade with one bloc is putting eggs in one basket. An EU recession then becomes potentially fatal, unless it spreads its wings further it faces dangers in a dying market. There is a whole emerging market they are missing out on because of EU navel-gazing and the money merry-go-round of trade. You give me this money, I give it back and you give it back. EU is a reaction against free trade, to opt for preferential treatment and exclude viable competitors. Africa is being screwed by the EU, EU companies dodge $200bn in tax to our continent and they give us $40bn in aid but with conditions that further cripple us. So I cannot love an entity that oppresses my people, a vampire-superstate sucking a continent dry.

As an educated liberal I should be really pro-EU, I should see Poles, Romanians, Bulgarians as my brothers, and they are. However, there is a huge disconnect between the electorate and politicians on both sides, it is hugely complex. The working classes have not benefited as much, they can go to Mabella without visas, but their jobs are gone. The middle classes could now have cheap nannies, and be waited on by servile foreigners who are glad to be earning poverty wages. They could get cheap Camembert and brie, all their favourite continental delicacies, but there is a cost. These angry working classes will form the bulwark of future xenophobic mass-movements because the liberal Eurocrats failed to listen to minor grumbles. The result will be tight, it will be a bloody nose for EU with a narrow victory. Will they back down and be more conciliatory or double down on “Take it or leave it?” The superstate is a failed project, Greece has shown us that national interests cannot be reconciled with regional interests. Britain should stay, but plot another more global future, it should gradually reduce trade with EU and seek emerging markets. The EU is aging and reducing in population, drowning in debt, it has no long-term future demographically compared to the Emerging Economies. If Britain ties itself to this sinking ship, then it will sink too, so we need to gradually consciously uncoupling, not a brexit. There is a whole new world out there, staying in the EU is cozy but it is a slow death. EU is unifying but exclusive, to the point where Africans are drowning to get to this Promised Land. Europeans call it unity, but it is collective xenophobia. Lower your tariffs, let African farmers make a living so they don’t come and bother you there. The EU is needs to look at its effects beyond its borders, the unfairness of it, or we shall have these strops of nationalism and gradual fragmentation in a world where states don’t matter anymore. I live globally. So should the UK.